Modern computing systems generate heat during operation. The heat may affect certain platform components of a system and is therefore generally required to be dissipated or removed from the system. Heat generated by the computing system may be limited or reduced using various thermal management techniques and/or heat dissipation techniques. For example, heat generated by a processor may be dissipated by creating a flow of air using a fan or blower. Further, various platform-level cooling devices may be implemented in conjunction with the fan or blower to enhance heat dissipation, such as heat pipes, heat spreaders, heat sinks, vents, phase change materials or liquid-based coolants.
Traditional blowers used in portable computing systems may generate flows of air to remove or dissipate heat, but they also generate high levels of noise and occupy large amounts of space. This may be problematic in notebook computers, for example, because ergonomic acoustic limits may be low to ensure a satisfactory user experience and space within an enclosure is limited due to the ever-decreasing size of portable computing systems. Because of the ergonomic acoustic limits and other restrictions, the cooling capacity of traditional systems may be thermally limited because standard blowers may not be allowed to run at their maximum speed, resulting in reduced efficiency for the blower and reduced cooling capacity for the system. Additionally, the efficiency of traditional blowers that are scaled down in size to accommodate the limited space available within portable computing systems decreases resulted in a reduced cooling capacity for the system. Consequently, a need exists for improved cooling techniques for notebook computers.